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‘Certainly.’ Amy suppressed a sigh.
‘What has your Harry been telling the teachers?’ she demanded. ‘Look at my Darcey-Mae! See how upset she is!’
Darcey-Mae was fiddling with her pony-tail, until nudged by her mother, at which point she started crying, as if on cue.
‘I don’t know. Harry, what have you been telling the teachers?’ she asked, sweetly. Harry responded with enthusiasm.
‘Oh! I told them about the Lake District and the sheep poo and Goat Gunge. I told them about meeting Mickey Mouse and how Laurie threw up in a bin, and how Dad got sunburnt all on one side, and how we saw a dead rat in the airport car park, and I —’
‘What did you tell them about Darcey-Mae, Harry?’ asked Mrs. Fenton with all the authority of which she was capable.
‘The truth. Like Mam and Dad told me to. Olly did too.’
‘But Oliver is Darcey-Mae’s boyfriend. He wouldn’t tell tales on her unless someone had put him up to it, would you Oliver?’ She turned to Oliver with her sweetest smile.
‘I don’t want to be Darcey-Mae’s boyfriend any more. We split up. Amy said I didn’t have to be anybody’s boyfriend if I don’t want to. So, I’m not.’
‘Amy? Who is Amy?’
‘I’m Amy.’
‘Oh yes, of course, I’d forgotten. So this is all down to you is it? Does it make you proud, trying to split up a little romance? Breaking my daughter’s heart?’
Darcey-Mae was picking her nose and didn’t look particularly heart-broken right now.
'I made up my own mind all by myself.’ Oliver was standing next to Harry, but he took a defiant step forward towards Darcey-Mae. ‘Amy just said I didn’t have to, that’s all.’
‘You must have been playing with Harry over the summer. I didn’t think you and Harry were friends.’ Mrs. Fenton eyed the boys suspiciously.
‘We weren’t ‘til we went on holiday. Now we’re best friends, aren’t we, Olly? Swallows and Amazons forever, that’s us.’
‘On holiday?’
‘Yeah, we went camping and Olly was in the campervan next door.’
‘You went on holiday together?’
‘Not exactly. But we’re going to next summer, aren’t we, Dad?’
‘If you’d like to.’
‘Yeah. Me and Harry decided today when you and Amy, like, make up your minds about it and you get together properly, you’ll have the bed in downstairs of the campervan and we’ll have the pop top and we won’t have to take Harry’s tent that blew down.’
‘You wouldn’t mind if me and Amy were in a relationship?’
‘As long as I don’t have to share a bedroom with Harry. He farts and I don’t want him farting on my things. Come on, Harry, let’s go and play wrestling on the grass over there.’
‘Powerslam!’ yelled Harry as the two boys ran off towards the field.
The look on Mrs. Fenton’s face was a picture as she surveyed Amy and Matt.
‘Well, I … well, that’s unexpected,’ she said. ‘I rather thought you weren’t ready for a relationship, so soon after Stella’s tragic death.’
‘Yes. I wasn’t expecting it either!’ Matt smiled at Amy. ‘And I thought it was going to take a lot longer for Olly to come round to the idea of us being together.’
Before Amy had a chance to reply, the girls’ cloakroom door opened, and the head teacher came towards them.
‘Oh look,’ said Nessa Fenton with satisfaction. ‘I think Ms. Lewandowska wants to talk to you, Mrs. Brand.’
‘Actually, it was you I was hoping to see, Mrs. Fenton. Can we have a little word about Darcey-Mae? Perhaps you’d like to come through to my office?’
Matt and Amy smiled at each other as Mrs. Fenton followed Ms. Lewandowska towards the head teacher’s office, her head down and Darcey-Mae trailing reluctantly after her.
Amy picked up Harry’s discarded school bag. ‘It sounds like we’ve got the Harry and Oliver seal of approval after all!’ she said.
‘It does, doesn’t it?’ Matt replied, with a smile. ‘Come on, boys, you can play wrestling at our house. Let’s go home for some tea, shall we?’
He held out his hand to her. Grinning broadly, she took it, and hand-in-hand they walked out of the playground together.
The End.
